This is not intended to bring an end to the camcorder market, it is intended put HD video capabilities in your pocket. Just as pocket sized cameras are not intended to replace SRLs, pocket cams should not be judged by their ability to replace a camcorder. They should be evaluated by their ability to capture impromptu short film moments.

“It’s like you’re dreamin’ about Gorgonzola cheese when it’s clearly Brie time, baby.”

As to which video capture format is better for a pocket cam, I prefer JMPEG as it offers superior frame capture over MPEG4. I love the ability to grab high quality stills from video sequences that are candid and uncomposed. There are too many occasions when cameras and camcorders have failed to serve me in that way.

“Leave it to a dago to bring a knife to a gun fight.”

If you need more than 26 minutes (8GB card) of video capture, it’s typically something important. Why would you knowingly bring the limitations of a pocket cam into that situation? I would not want to be stuck holding a pocket cam that long. There are times when a dedicated camcorder is the order of the day; times when you should also have a tripod, an external mic, and a good idea of the shots you want. For everything else, there will be a TX1 in my pocket. As my two pockets also have to hold my wallet, phone, and iPod the TX1 is barely small enough for my carry everywhere needs.

The Sanyo Xacti HD device does MPEG-4 at 9Mbit/sec in “Super High Quality” mode. The compression artifacts are pretty glaring.

I’ve seen no mention of bit-rate anywhere for this slick little Canon.

This looks sweet though.